by Al Massey
I just finished reading a piece in a technical journal that, among other things, claimed that “The Government will be a living thing to its citizens instead of an abstract and unseen force.” The article went on to say “Elected representatives will not be able to evade their responsibility by those who put them into office.”
“This new medium will be like a gigantic school,” the magazine says, and “have a greater student body than all the our universities put together.” Wow, does this sound familiar, I have been talking about this for some time now. Only thing is the Magazine in question is Radio Broadcast and the article appeared in 1922. Radio was the new technology.
Reminds me of another article I read some time ago where Erik Barnouw, a professor emeritus of Columbia University was saying something along the lines “each time a new medium comes along, great hopes are raised.” The good professor goes on to remind us “…the lesson of history is that new medium provides new opportunities for selling as well as for education, for monopolists as well as for democracy and for abuse as well as for benefit.”
Today’s new medium the “Internet” bears some striking similarities to radio not only in the way it was formed and developed but in its growth as well.
The article in Radio Broadcast served to point out that radio was growing because of amateurs. The fact was, at that time radios weren’t widely available and if you could find one for sale, chances are it would be priced out of range for the average household. So amateurs assembled their own on a wing and a prayer. Even then there was not much they could use them for.
But like all advances in technology it wasn’t long before the money kings smelled fresh meat and the politicos decided that that there must be something to it. Corporate American didn’t quite know what to make of it at first but they knew they wanted a piece of it that’s for sure. At first the “spin doctors” of the day didn’t have a clue either but before long the buzz started with well placed verse “Radio will bring the blessings of knowledge, culture and democracy into every home in America.”
What right thinking politician could resist? “Let us not forget that the value of this great system does not lie primarily in its extent or even in its efficiency. Its worth depends on the use that is made of it. For the first time in human history we have available to us the ability to communicate simultaneously with millions of our fellowmen, to furnish entertainment, instruction, widening vision of national problems and national events. An obligation rests on us to see that it is devoted to real service and to develop the material that is transmitted into that which is really worthwhile.” Herbert Hoover, speaking in 1924 as the Secretary of Commerce. And the “great system”? Not the Internet. Nor the Infobahn. It was radio. Plain ol’ broadcast radio. The race was on.
Journalist tried to outdo each other in their ecstasy over the radio craze. Politicians proclaimed it the product of American genius and radio stations were multiplying faster than cockroaches.
What started as a hobby grew rapidly. Big money made it grow new laws, bureaucracies acted as fertilizer, and before you cold say Fibber Magee and Molly it was everywhere. But, while it grew and today it is bigger than ever, it lost something, to some something BIG. It lost its interactivity. It went from being a user dominated and user-controlled medium to one dominated by business and controlled by Congress.
Then at the Third Annual Radio Congress in Washington, D.C. in 1924 Secretary Hoover proclaimed “I believe that the quickest way to kill broadcasting would be to use it for direct advertising. The reader of the newspaper has an option whether he will read an ad or not,” argued Hoover “but if a speech by the President is to be used as the meat in a sandwich of two patent medicine advertisements, then there will be no radio left.” He finished his remarks by saying “It is inconceivable that we should allow so great an opportunity for service to be drowned in advertising chatter.”
Pardon me for this little excursion down memory lane. We all know the lessons about ignoring our history and being doomed to repeat it. No matter what your view of old Herbert is I urge you all, next time you log on to this “great new medium,” to give some thought to his words. We are in very real danger of losing our user dominated interactivity to others. In some respects we already have.
“Windows Error Message: To “shut down” your system, type “WIN”
Taking aim right at the heart of the low-cost PC market, Intel has introduced their second-generation Celeron processor. This processor is in sharp contrast to their initial entry in this market.
The first generation of Celerons didn’t have any Level 2 cache onboard and couldn’t play nice with external cache.
The new Celerons include 128KB of Level 2 cache, a little item that has dramatically improved their performance.
It seems that the boss hogs at Intel grossly underestimated the market for low-cost under $1,000 PC systems and this gave AMD, Cyrix and IDT the chance to get a foothold in the market. With Intel’s re-entry into the market AMD and Cyrix better act fast to counter the move. Look for this faster/cheaper market to really heat up as the holidays approach.
WinErr 16547: LPT1 not found. Use backup. (PENCIL & PAPER.SYS)
Well, it looks as though Judge Penfield Jackson is taking a peek at Ken Starr’s book and what started out as a nice little browser war is turning into a “let’s lynch Bill Gates from the highest tree” party. Everybody is trying to get into the act, including the Attorneys General of some 20 states. I look for a class action suit any time now. Let’s see, how about anybody that’s ever received a GPF or blue screen of death. The buzzards are circling, fresh blood is on the virtual horizon.
The Department Of Justice is putting the spin on everything Microsoft and alleging that the chairman Bill’s behavior goes well beyond the browser horizon. Examples, most notably, include mention of Microsoft’s alleged strong-arm tactics used against the likes of Apple Computer Inc., Intel Corp. and RealNetworks Inc when it comes to supporting non-Microsoft browsers, Sun Microsystems Inc.’s Java technology and even multimedia efforts.
The DOJ hopes to prove that Microsoft has engaged in a pattern of illegal behavior that stems as far back as the days of DOS and its efforts to crush the competing operating system DR-DOS.
One of the DOJ spin-doctors even went so far as to say “We hope to prove a long standing policy of Microsoft’s is to crush the competition.” Well DUH! So the dark duke wants to do away with his competitors, what a no-brainer this is.
I don’t know how to keep score in this race. I had this dream the other night of Justice lawyers standing in the middle of the courtroom swinging a dead cat trying to hit anything and everything that moved.
Just a side note here, I watch these government satchel carriers at news conferences and they all look like Bambi caught in the headlights of a Peterbuilt. I get the impression they are all afraid of the big guns at Microsoft.
The DOJ has loaded up on birdshot and charging Microsoft with everything from anti-trust to parking violations. I don’t know how this will shake out but I do know that no matter who wins it won’t be you or me. In fact it will be US the users that are going to loose…BIG TIME.
Al Massey is a HAL-PC member who can be reached at almas@hal-pc.org. n
E-mail me at webmaster@hal-pc.org with any comments you have and tell me what you want to see here.